


Darkness Is Your Demon

by AvengersTime



Series: Deaf!Clint [2]
Category: Marvel (Comics), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (2012)
Genre: Angst, Clint doesn't like the dark, F/M, Tony Stark Has A Heart, Tony is an ass, deaf!Clint, how does one tag correctly
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-01-03
Updated: 2013-03-03
Packaged: 2017-11-23 11:08:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,970
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/621448
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AvengersTime/pseuds/AvengersTime
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When one sense is gone, the others enhance. You take away the sense you're most depended on from your enhancements, and you feel truly, helplessly, defenseless. Or, in which Tony and Clint are trapped in a cold, dark basement during an invasion of the Tower. Yet another deaf!Clint short by a (almost) deaf author.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> OH, LOOK! I actually made another part for this series. I apologize for the long wait. I didn't feel up to writing this past month, just too busy and I definitely didn't want to write about hearing loss. Just one of those times where having hearing loss pisses me off to no end. I had my hearing tested a bit before the holidays and it dropped slightly again in my right ear. Clint in this fic is lucky in some terms, because his hearing loss is fairly constant more or less. It won't go down, but there's a possibility it might go up. Mine's the opposite. On another side note, I have 3(?) mini-fics to add to the series. Or I might write a fic about Clint and Natasha's relationship (I made it an official pairing due to popular request and I really do want to try a Clintasha fic) and how either Clint's hearing begins to go up or down, I haven't decided. But probably down, because I have a lot of experience in that and how it's kind of scary and such. OK, RANT OVER. 
> 
> Thank you so much, constancebonacieux, for being being a beta for the series!

Clint didn’t like small spaces. Especially very low small spaces. Like the basement of Stark Tower, which was similar to a war bunker. So why he had agreed to accompany Tony to help him settle his robots into his holding area was beyond him. The holding area, as of now, held two suits under incredible security and while normally Butterfingers and You would be upstairs in the lab with Tony, both programs were used in making quick adjustments to the security of the suits. Dum-E (Dummy) would stay in the lab, which Clint was grateful for because that robot is the only one that didn’t use its prongs to pick at his pants or knock over his drink. “They’re not good with new people,” Tony had remarked, an annoying smirk on his face. Clint had only replied with a scowl. 

“Hey, You, Butterfingers , keep up!” Tony called to the two that rolled behind them down the long, dimly lit hallway. “You’re being slow. I know you don’t want to leave the lab, but you know how it is.” 

“What, do they feel homesick already?” Clint asked skeptically. Tony’s creations were advanced, yes, but he’s pretty sure that his robots didn’t have “feelings”. 

“Nah, they’re just wondering where Dummy is. They’re spoiled brats, too. He’s been around the longest, and they get fidgety in their coding when they’re not all together.”  
“Robotic separation issues,” Clint chuckled, mostly to himself. “Who knew?”

Tony smiled, pleased that at least someone appreciated his creations. If Clint kept this up, Tony might end up building Clint his own AI that would no doubt follow him around like the current ones did Tony. He had mixed feelings about that. From the whining chortles that the robots gave when Tony was gone for more than 20 minutes, they wouldn’t do well when Clint was on a mission. Knowing Tony, he’d try to make it the worst experience first, laugh about it, and then fix it with smugness. 

“Here we are.” They stopped in front a huge bulk of a door with a code panel, and Tony entered in the code such quickness Clint couldn’t memorize it even if he bothered to try. The door slid open, and the AI’s chirped and pushed them both aside to enter. “Oh, now you guys are excited! Well, don’t just stand there, Barton, get in here.” 

Clint shook his head in exasperation, blinking against the sudden glare of light. Once his eyesight adjusted, he examined the room. It wasn’t as impressive as Tony and Bruce’s labs, being exactly as it was: a storage space for important property. Suits were lined up in glass chambers, and in the middle it looked like it opened up for the multiple mechanical arms that helped assemble the armor. Each upgraded suit was more automatic, but these were older suits that worked just as well if need be. 

It was clear to Clint that Tony was paranoid of someone stealing his tech and using it for bad intentions. He knew why, he read Tony’s file and how the former president of SI, Obadiah Stane, had been dealing under the table and sent Stark Industries weapons to terrorists. In fact, Clint had been with Fury as they monitored Stark’s activities after his return from Afghanistan, and Coulson had told him briefly what happened with the case before it died down until reports of Tony dying from palladium poisoning had reached SHIELD. At that time, Clint couldn’t have cared less. Stark had been just a genius, a valuable but expendable ally that really didn’t want to cooperate at all. 

If Tony had been dying now, Clint would make sure he didn’t with all his power. Of all the Avengers minus Natasha, Tony was probably the one he liked the most…in a way. He was an asshole, but Clint could be too. And he didn’t look at him any different when he had told the team about his hearing loss. In fact, he seemed to be in a lighter mood around him. He supposed it was because he had something to compare to Clint: having something that can affect you in a bad way but still making good out of it. In Tony’s case, it was the arc reactor.

“Not much, is it?” Tony mused, snapping Clint out of his thoughts. “I haven’t been down here that much. This is just one floor from the arc reactor that powers the building, so if something were to explode down here it could…make that blow up. Which would be a very big explosion, and I just fixed this building. So no touchy, yeah?”

“I like my room, so I’ll heed your warning.” Clint retorted. “Ow! Hey!” 

Tony snickered as Butterfinger twirled his three-fingered “arm” in amusement from running over Clint’s foot. “He likes you.” 

“Yeah, well, I don’t like him.” Clint grumbled, shooing away the AI. “Can we get out of here? Natasha brought some of the best movies I loved and they have subtitles. Do you have any idea how hard it is to get classic movies in subtitles these days?” 

“Near impossible, if it-“ 

“Sir, if I may, there’s been a breach in our firewall of the Tower databases.” Jarvis suddenly announced, cutting Tony off. Clint’s eyes snapped to Tony, confused. A security breach? Tony’s security? That was unlikely. 

“What the fuck? Pinpoint it and get rid of it, J!” Tony’s face went dead serious, his lips into a thin line. “SR2-59047 Protocol, but do not engage. Burn and track.” 

“My severs are now threatened of being neutralized, sir. How would you like me to proceed?” Jarvis asked, and before Tony could answer, the bodiless AI continued, “Emergency lockdown initiated.” 

“No, J!” Tony growled, and glanced to where the heavy metal door was beginning to slide close. “Clint, we have to get out of the basement before the lockdown is finished. I don’t know how long we’ll be down here.” 

Clint didn’t need Tony to say it again. He made sure Tony stayed ahead of him as they ran to the exit, because…well, it was an instinct. Civilians need to be protected. There was just a foot left of space, and they were two feet away.

One foot…

¾…

½…

They were going to make it, barely. Right as they slipped into the hallway, the lights blinked out. It was pitch black. There wasn’t any light. Or anywhere to escape. Clint’s heart rate accelerated a little. “Tony!” 

“Clint?” The muffled sounding response made Clint’s stomach twist. Was he alone? Had he saw wrong and Tony was still on his side? 

“Tony, where…where are you?” Clint asked, trying to keep the edge from his voice. 

“Um, I think...hang on…” 

Clint flinched violently as a hand touched his bicep, his arms jutted out in defense, and there was the sickening feeling of a nose breaking under his fist. 

“Owww!” Tony’s pained moan echoed, and Clint mentally kicked himself. Tony had been next to him, not in the other room. “What the hell, bird brain? I liked how my nose looked!” 

“Shit, Tony! Are you all right?” he asked, gripping Tony’s shoulder to keep him steady. “Hold still.” 

“Goddammit. Jarvis better get...power up soon, ...think I’m going to bleed...death.” Tony grumbled, and Clint strained to capture every word. Fuck. The dark was one of those things on the list of Clint’s hate list. And with the mutters and almost unintelligible words that Tony kept saying, Tony was about to be at the top of the list. He couldn’t read lips in the dark, and nothing was ever what it seemed. Advanced as his hearing aids were, they had no sense of direction or closeness. Things that were close sounded far away, right was left, left was right, that sort of thing. Hesitantly, he reached up from Tony’s shoulder to his chin, and then grimaced he felt warm, sticky liquid. 

“Sorry, Clint, I don’t swing that way.” The billionaire snapped, swatting his hand away. 

“Shut up, Tony. And lean your head back. I’d say pinch your nose, but…”

“Not happening. Hurts like a bitch to touch.” 

Was it just him, or did the air feel thicker? “We’re not going to run out of oxygen or anything, are we?” 

“Not for 8 hours at least. So you don’t have an excuse to kill me in here when I get on your nerves.” Tony’s voice sounded strange from his nose being plugged. So, that meant Clint was just freaking out. That was good and bad, he supposed. His fingers twitched anxiously and his eyes darted in all directions, looking for a sight, an object in the dark that he could focus on.

“And how long are we going to be stuck down here?” 

“I don’t know. Not long, I would imagine. Jarvis has to cool down and make sure there’s no one trying to get in. If there’s a stupid bastard trying to hack me, you can bet he’ll be shot down pretty fast.” The calmness in Tony’s voice pissed Clint off. 

“Can you make it soon?” he demanded. 

“I’d like to, but I can’t. Do you see any computers in here? Anything I can possibly use to unlock the Tower?” Tony shot back. “What the hell is your problem?”

“I don’t like the dark.” 

“Are you shitting me right now? You’re scared of the _dark_?” Tony’s voice was incredulous, and Clint could imagine the smirk curling on his lips. 

“I’m not scared, Tony. I just hate it.” Clint wanted very much to punch Tony in the face again, and this time on purpose. Couldn’t he just let it go? 

“Yeah, sure. Want to tell me why?” 

“No.”

“Tell dear Tony what’s on your mind, birdy.” Tony sing-songed. 

“How about we sit and wait _quietly_?” 

“Isn’t everything _quiet_ to you?” Tony snarked, then paused, “Wait, wait, I get it. You can’t read my lips.” 

Clint didn’t answer, and that answered Tony’s question pretty much. 

“Alright, hey. I’m sorry.” 

“Don’t be. It’s pretty stupid, I know that.” There was a long, drawn out silence that seemed like it lasted an eternity in the darkness. Clint could imagine Tony thinking of the time estimates of when they could get out of here, of-

“I don’t like caves.” Tony said abruptly, a little louder and clearer, probably for Clint’s benefit. “Not scared of them, but I get a little fidgety. You know what I mean?” 

“Yes,” Clint answered, and he meant it. He knew Tony was aware that he knew why, too. Clint’s been through a lot, most of it bloody and awful and nothing he would ever like to think about again, but he was trained to deal with it. He knew how to push it back and to know what his mission was if he was in a kind of position where there was torture and captivity. Tony, on the other hand, had been a civilian during Afghanistan, a man of genius but still a person who had gotten in over his head. 

“Holy shit! Why didn’t I think of this before?” Tony exclaimed, and then Clint heard the ripping of fabric. 

“Uh, Tony…”

“Hallelujah!” Brilliant blue light erupted from the arc reactor in Tony’s chest. Clint blanched as he noticed the blood that was now smeared all around Tony’s lower face, the cocky grin making it look a bit eerie with the pale light. It’s the first time Clint has seen the arc reactor from beneath his shirt. “Don’t gawk at me.” 

“I’m not.” Clint blinked furiously against the fuzziness in his vision, and realized that it was closer quarters than he realized. The hallway was narrow and long, made up of a concrete floor and wall. “Where’s the door?” 

“I think it’s that way.” Tony frowned. With the shining blue illumination, he could see and hear everything Tony was saying without being completely paranoid. “But it doesn’t really matter now, does it?” 

“No,” Clint agreed. His stomach was still doing flips, but he shrugged it down. Clint eased himself down to the ground and leaned his head back against the wall, and the two were silent for what felt like a long time. 

Tony shifted on his feet, glancing down at his arc reactor. “You are damn lucky I like you, you know that? I hate showing off this thing. You better make sure Fury gives me a fucking medal.”  
“No medals. You only get a lecture, and maybe a nice pat on the back and maybe, if you’re just as annoying as you usually are, he’ll give you some paperwork!” Clint teased in an overly cheerful voice. 

“Well I am not helping you anytime soon again, that’s for sure.” 

Clint would have replied with another sarcastic comment, maybe a few insults if it felt necessary, anything to distract himself, right? But Tony suddenly froze in place, brows furrowing.  
“Did you hear that?” 

“Don’t ask me that, you make me nervous.” Clint said tersely. Clint placed a hand on the concrete, keeping a steady gaze on Tony, on the light, but he listened. In his own adapted way. There was nothing at first, although Tony kept roaming his eyes over the ceiling, insisting there was something. “Do you think someone broke in?” 

Tony opened his mouth to obviously scold him of how ridiculous that was, that it wasn’t possible. But then there was a CLANG that even Clint could hear. “Where’s that coming from, Tony?”  
“Up above. Either someone is pulling a really stupid move, or the others are tearing apart the place to get our sorry asses out of here.” Tony grumbled. 

Clint kept a hand on the wall, and then felt a rumble within. Then a massive one, that shook all around them and almost made Clint lose his footing, and Tony tumbled to the ground. Then all the noises stopped. The vibrations, sounds, everything. The silence droned into the room. 

Until, of course, the sickening creaking and rumbling began again. Tony gripped his arm. “Holy shit, the floors are collapsing. That was an explosion, and the floors are starting to collapse!”  
True to Tony’s word, the cement ceiling cracked, groaned, and they ducked their heads as a chunk of debris came down around them, small chucks following and even pipes. Tony and Clint looked at each other, faces grim, and Clint could see slight panic in Tony’s eyes that he tried desperately to hide. “Cover your head!” Clint yelled, and it was then that the whole thing decided to cave in.

Clint dropped to the floor automatically, and only had time to roll over onto his stomach and cover his head, seeing Tony do the same a few feet away, as the rest of the ceiling came crashing down. Then the darkness came again.


	2. Tacos Assemble!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This took waaaay too long. Apologies.
> 
> PLEASE NOTE TO AVOID CONFUSION: "HA" is an abbreviation I often use for hearing aids. Like Jarvis.

There was a lot Clint couldn't understand right now. Like why someone was slapping his face and _what the fuck, ow,_ and why his leg was hurting something awful and there was a hard pressure on his shoulder. His brain refused to click, didn't comprehend why there was shouting and the taste and smell of metal and dust in the air. Something was off.

He was submerged in a lot of darkness, this time in the safety of his own closed eyes and not the weighting darkness of things around him and sounds he could barely hear and not see. That was what different, there was no light of Tony's arc reactor. Where was Tony? He'd be talking. Of course he would be.

Maybe he'd fallen asleep, was dreaming all this. They were in the basement, waiting for someone to get to them- _Hey, what in the living hell was that horrible noise?_ He thought. It sounded like a screeching, high pitched and meeting his ears in a vengeance. That was the sound his hearing aids made when they were out of place, so he lifted one hand that felt way too heavy to fiddle with his HA's, but something held his hand; it was soft and cold and is that Natasha?

" _Clint!_ " One voice registered completely, and since it was Natasha and she sounded distressed, his eyes snapped open. Not much would come into focus, but he saw Natasha's red hair and pale face that was streaked with dirt. That wasn't right. He'd always found Natasha's "battle look" very sexy, as mentioned to her and replied with a glare, but they weren't in a battle, he was just stuck in a suffocating dark basement with Tony Stark. The pressure on his shoulder turned into the feeling of a hand gripping it, securing him.

"Hey," and he sounded like he swallowed a mouthful of sand. He grimaced and tried to shy away as something, his HA, slipped back into the shape of his ear and the disrupting screeching feed stopped. He realized that Natasha used that sound as a weapon to wake him up. Rude. Smart, but not okay because he hated that sound. "Wha's goin' on?"

"Someone bombed the bottom half of the Tower." Natasha said darkly, her facial features becoming clearer.

"What?!" he exclaimed, attempting to sit up, but that was a mistake, because everything hurt. He was lying in Natasha's lap, so maybe he'd just stay still for now because it was pretty comfy. That wasn't right, they-

 _The rumbling, the shaking, Tony yelling and falling, and the ceiling collapsing, arc reactor light gone, gone, leaving the darkness behind…_ "Tony. Where's Tony?"

"He's fine. He's already being prepped to get into the ambulance." She assured him, and Clint risked rolling his eyes back and forth, seeing that he was in the middle of the street in front of the Tower, the Tower that was smoking and he saw fires poking out of the bottom half, being subdued by hoses of firefighters. "Everyone is out and we're waiting for more backup. Now, you have to stay awake until a paramedic says it's okay for you to sleep, got it?"

"Mmm," he blinked, saw that there were people behind police-issued yellow tape, all moving in panicky ways, shouting, demanding answers. It was too crowded, and, yes, too loud. He wanted silence right now. He doubted Natasha would let him take out his hearing aids. "No thanks."

"Don't you dare, Barton. Stay awake. I don't know if you have a concussion." Natasha's voice was firm, and her holds on his shoulder and hand tightened.

"Give me a kiss and I'll never sleep," he slurred, and where did _that_ come from?

"I'll have tacos for you when you wake up after they check you over," Natasha told him, as if he said nothing. Wonderful, wonderful Natasha who didn't listen to him drunk or half-conscious or otherwise. He wouldn't mind a kiss, though…

"Acceptable. Know what I like?"

"Of course. Paramedic is coming," Natasha said as she looked up to where he was too tired to follow. But the strength keeping him awake fell dramatically, leaving him and his pounding head lolling on Natasha, sound and vision fading out.

Natasha was talking to him, or was it yelling? Fuck it, he couldn't tell. She was shaking him and fuck her, not in the good way, because he wanted to sleep. His wish was granted as a paramedic leaned over him, poked and talked to him, and told him it was safe to sleep. Clint gratefully complied, and the last thing he felt was Natasha running her fingers through his hair.

*

When he woke up, there wasn't any noise. No shouting, no annoying screeching from his hearing aids. Actually, he didn't think his hearing aids were in at all, because he couldn't feel them.

There was no pain to feel, either. He opened his eyes and stared up at a white ceiling. The sterile smell and white everything screamed hospital. He blinked the fogginess out of his mind and rolled his head over.

And what do you know, Tony was sitting in a wheelchair no less, face cleanly shaven save a 5 o'clock shadow from a gash on his chin, nose looking swollen and supplied with butterfly bandage, dressed in a black Iron Man t-shirt and gray sweatpants. Munching on a taco.

There was no one else in the room, and he gritted his teeth because that meant there was no Natasha to give him his HA's. Where was she? She owed him his own taco.

He'd hoped Tony wouldn't notice him awake, but Tony looked up from his food to Clint, and nodded at him, not opening his mouth. Clint closed his eyes again and turned his head away, hoping he'd get the picture he couldn't talk.

Something was placed into the palm of his hand resting at his side and other fingers moved to close his hand. His hearing aids were there. He opened one eye and saw Tony looking between his hand and Clint expectantly.

Clint put his hearing aids in, then breathed relief as he often did when sound greeted him, and muttered a thanks to Tony.

"How are you feeling?" Tony asked, cocking his head.

"I'm fine. You look worse than I feel. So how are you feeling?"

Tony snorted. "You say that now because of the painkillers."

Clint's eyes roamed to the heavily bandaged bulge under the blankets where his leg should be. "Huh. That definitely looks like it should hurt."

"Some metal got stuck in there, so they did surgery to get it out. No broken bones, but it'll hurt like a bitch. You have some heavy bruising, too, but no less than me." He finished his taco and leaned back into the wheelchair.

"I'm shocked you're willingly sitting in that thing." Clint scoffed.

"I broke my ankle, and one rib and some other bruised ribs, so I'm either stuck in this or forced to sit in a hospital bed twiddling my thumbs. Pepper and I compromised." He scowled.

"Aw, Stark's listening to doctor's orders." He teased cheekily.

"Shut up. Your girl and my girl are a deadly match when they want something, okay?"

Clint thought about it, and agreed whole heartedly. Terrifying. "Wait- Natasha is not my girl."

Tony stared him down skeptically.

Clint decided this was the best time to change the subject before he said something he'd regret later. "Where is everyone? Tasha owes me tacos."

"Pepper forced everyone to take a two hour break for showers, food, and sleep. They've been waiting on our sorry asses to wake up. I woke up last night," Tony explained. Clint noticed then that the long couch was rumpled and a few blankets were tossed to the ground and cups of coffee were everywhere.

"…and the bombing was three days ago. My Tower is a mess, I'm a mess, and they shaved off my goatee. Today is not a great day for me."

Clint groaned. "What stupid ass decided to bomb Stark Tower?"

"Not a terrorist group, thank God." Something dark glinted in Tony's brown eyes, but it faded as quickly as it showed. "A.I.M. A weapons company. We don't get along, and I guess a rogue went too far. The CEO is denying everything, and they're too high up in too many places to get any concrete, but they're losing stock points. Badly."

"And no one else is hurt?"

"Minor cuts and bruises, you know. Luckily most of the team was on the higher levels. We were in the wrong place at the wrong time." Tony shrugged, and winced. "Sorry 'bout that."

"Don't worry about it." Clint held back any sarcastic remarks he had for Tony apologizing. Tony _must_ have been on some painkillers messing with his brain. It was the only explanation. "Your bots are okay?"

"Why? Did you suck up to them already?" Tony smiled wryly. "Yeah. I'll fix whatever bumps they have when I sneak my way past here."

"And here is…? The helicarrier?"

"One and only." Tony sighed, and then rolled his wheelchair back, grabbing a bag off a small table. "Here, I'll do the honors of presenting you your tacos."

Clint snatched the bag and dug out the wrapped taco. He unwrapped it, saw everything he'd ever loved in a taco, and took a huge bite. Sweet Jesus. Not worth missing a kiss from Natasha, but it'll do.

"Excuse me?" a voice asked, almost demanded, and Tony started laughing.

He just about spit out his food as it dawned on him. He'd said that _out loud_ , and Natasha was leaning against the doorway with her arms crossed and her eyebrows raised. "Hi, Tasha." He grinned, trying to play around it.

Natasha did not return said grin. "You are in trouble."

Tony just kept laughing.

*

Later, after a freshly showered Steve rolled a protesting Tony back to his room so that he could rest, and the rest of the team said hello and covered all the details of the attack, it was just him and Natasha.

The room still smelled of tacos and it was almost nauseating. Clint's sense of smell was enhanced, of course, so this wasn't a surprise. But it kept tacos on his mind.

He should have guessed there was a reason the SHIELD doctors never let him eat in these rooms.

He shifted on the bed, waiting impatiently for Natasha to talk. No other position was comfortable, so he stuck with sitting up on the bed with his hands clasped in his lap. He wanted to at least turn on the goddamn television (that SHIELD didn't even bother to install with closed captioning, those little shits) to get rid of the uncomfortable silence. He was used to silence, but it was usually a whatever-I-can't-hear silence. During those silences, people who knew about his hearing loss didn't speak to him, not realizing that there was a 75% chance Clint would understand them by reading their lips. You didn't need to hear to know what people were saying, contrary to popular belief. Sure, it was easier, but-

"We'd never work, would we?"

Clint froze at the outburst. He looked up at Natasha, who was now sitting at the foot of his bed. "I don't know. Maybe? I've never really had a long relationship."

"Neither have I," Natasha admitted, and Clint knew. Clint knew Natasha's past and over the years he'd learned very carefully to avoid bringing up those memories at any time.

"We could…" he frowned, "try? See if it works?"

"Clint Barton, are you asking me to be your girlfriend?" Natasha asked incredulously.

"It's either that or longing sex!" he exclaimed nervously and snapped his mouth shut. Oh, God. Clint didn't just get nervous. Not around Natasha.

Natasha suddenly looked even more beautiful than before, if that was possible. He loved Natasha; he had for a long time. She was the one to stand by his side. She was the one to hand him his hearing aids, to fight battles with him, to wake him up and tell him it was okay when he had nightmares in the dead of night.

Hell, they might as well be already together. If you didn't add the no kissing and sex.

Despite Natasha being his best friend, it didn't seem weird thinking about kissing her or about…that other thing, either.

Natasha's face was impassive. It was hard to tell if she was thinking about this or otherwise. He couldn't wait until she snapped out of it anymore. He was done. And also, he had nothing to lose.

He leaned forward, placed one hand on her cheek, and her eyes lifted a little, looking at him dead in the eye.

They were both aching for it when their lips meet, and within moments they were pressing harder and Clint's arms went around Natasha, holding on to her like he had without touching her for years. Natasha kneaded sore muscles in his back, as her lips and tongue worked Clint's mouth. Clint's tongue traced lightly over lips before just reveling in the feeling of lips against lips and he didn't realize how it long it'd been since he'd kissed someone like this until now. She was gasping slightly when they broke apart, and Clint grinned, face feeling flushed.

"I think I can work with that."

This time, Natasha smiled.

*

Two weeks passed, and each day the team all helped in repairing the Tower. They were forced to spend nights at the helicarrier, but Tony promised that they'd be heading to his Malibu mansion soon. Clint actually looked forward to it.

They'd leave tomorrow, he announced.

Clint had discreetly slipped into Natasha's bed in her quarters that night. He'd been doing this a lot, but Natasha never complained. She just huddled close to him, and by morning they were intertwined limbs and flesh. SHIELD quarters could be loud, and he'd never understood how people could sleep with what he could hear with his HA's. His HA's were out now, and he stared at the ceiling in the darkness. He leaned his ear against Natasha's tank top-clad chest, right where her heart was, so he could feel and maybe hear the beats of her heart.

It was a lull to sleep he never thought he would want.

He hated waking up in the morning and not being able to hear her say "Good morning," or anything else she might say. He didn't tell her about it, of course, but she knew. As her good morning now, she gave him his hearing aids from the bedside table, and talked only when they were in place.

Clint couldn't hear. But he had everything he needed to be happy. Clint worked for SHIELD, and he was an Avenger. He was a superhero. He had friends that he never thought he'd have, and a girlfriend. Girlfriend, though, still felt alien to him.

He had Natasha. He had enough.


End file.
